Case Studies

Improving Team Performance Post Tsunami Rehabilitation

Background:

An international humanitarian organisatian involved in post Tsunami rehabilitation was running numerous multi cultural teams in a variety of functions; health, water sanitation, reconstruction, organisatianal development. Communications...
Teams were composed of iocal staff and international staff and worked closely with o number of other agency and commercial partners and stakeholders.

Problem:

Many team leaders had little if any formal training in managing a team, teams had no formal training in how to work effectively in teams. Work standards differed among different team members and there were issues with cross functional collaboration.

Goal:

Improve and standardize team performance and management. Enhance cross team collaboration through improving the quality of meeting management and the Facilitation of multi stakeholder decision making.

Service:

PLB Consulting Ltd worked with the Operations manager and head of HR to design a series of workshops to address the key needs. The workshops were delivered over several weeks to more than 60 staff involved in the rehabilitation teams. All team leaders first took part in a two day leadership workshop and within the following two weeks attended a second workshop with their own teams. Teams were trained together to improve general interpersonal relations and encourage cross team collaboration. The suite of workshops included

1. Leading High Performing Teams; The Team Management System approach was used to help managers identify their leadership and communication styles.
2. Working In High Performance Teams. The TMS Profiles were used to help team members to better understand their team role and contribution to the team. Teams agreed 'Team Charters' and care non negotiable behaviours that would guide future collaboration.
3. Facilitating Group Decision Making: Selected individuals were then trained in both facilitation skills and in managing meetings to further embed the collaborative approaches introduced in the other workshops. Diversity and crass cultural issues were dealt with as pragmatic questions in all of the workshops.

Result:

Team managers had a better understanding of their roles and responsibilities; they learned new skills to enable them to align individual team objectives with broader programme goals. Staff better understood their roles in the teams and the TMS profile provided illumination on personal work-style differences and gave people strategies of handling many of these. Behaviour that was creating dysfunction in teams was discussed in an open and transparent manner and allowed festering misunderstandings to be addressed. Spin off benefits were the open discussions and exploration of cross cultural issues, Managers report greater confidence in dealing with team and individual performance issues.

Improving the Quality of the Introduction of a Compulsory Training for HIV/AIDS in the workplace for a UN Agency

Background:

To comply with UN guidelines about improving awareness of HIV/AIDS and to reduce discrimination of HIV/AIDS affected co-workers, UN agencies prepared to introduce a programme of orientation and knowledge sharing. Facilitators for the programme were invited from the general staff and included medical and non medical experts.

Problem:

The majority of the in-house volunteers had not been trained in adult learning facilitation skills. The profile of the typical medical expert is one of lecturer which was not considered appropriate for this potentially sensitive issue.

Goal:

Prepare the in-house volunteers to be able to facilitate the orientation sessions in a participative way to reduce fears and resistance to discuss HIV/AIDS, and to encourage the sharing of concerns and experiences in a non-threatening, fun way to ensure that the key messages of the Orientation Sessions are taken on board.

Service:

We delivered a two day training of trainers to introduce brain based adult learning principles and methods to the volunteers and then allowed them to apply the approaches to the specific modules of the Orientation Programme.

Result:

The training was conducted in a fun, light hearted way that allowed for even the most intimate and challenging issues to be discussed and even modelled in a non threatening common sense way. The trainers identified innovative and entertaining ways of addressing the session contents that resulted in highly participative workshops. Volunteer sign up was high and everyone reported being much more confident and comfortable running the events. By-product was an increase in in-house volunteers for other training initiatives, and great feedback from participants.

Improving the Collaboration of Numerous Stakeholders to support the Five Year Plan of a National Humanitarian Organisation

Background:

A national humanitarian organisation operates in an island nation, one of the poorest countries in the world, suffering from political instability, insecurity and regular natural disasters. The organisation had spent considerable time and organisational energy in creating a Five Year Plan to guide and drive its activities and fund raising strategy. A meeting was to be held hosted by a key national partner and attended by representatives from eight of its major donors.

Problem:

Several of the donors had predetermined ideas of priorities for the organisation they would be prepared to fund. A few of them had limitations imposed by their governments on funding for specific activities that involved HIV/AIDS education and non discrimination.

Goal:

Get agreement of all partners on the Five Year Plan and get commitment from donors to support the core programmes and activities identified in the plan as priorities.

Service:

We met individually with key stakeholders, we got agreement on a programme intended to help the group define the key issues to be addressed and to encourage collaborative decision making. We facilitated the meeting to ensure solution focused process that would result in mutually supported agreements.

Result:

The meeting addressed long existing issues between the partners and the organisation and between the partners themselves. Solutions were found to circumvent political limitations on essential programmes for the country. The Five Year Plan was unanimously endorsed and the donors present committed to specific support for short term and longer term programmes. The success of this meeting influenced the support received in later regional meetings. Although political and natural incidence continues to plague the country, support from the key donors persists.

Improving the Transfer of Learning for a Global Health Organisation

Background:

A global health organisation was making significant investments in staff training and transfer of learning to local experts and communities. Feedback from the training initiatives indicated inconsistent quality and effectiveness. Following the establishment of an organisation wide learning policy, the organisation desired to improve organisation learning at all levels.

Problem:

Many subject matter experts were delivering training in traditional directive ways which was not having the impact intended. In addition lessons were not being gleaned on a consistent basis from executed programmes and activities.

Goal:

Improve the competence and performance of in-house trainers and create a cadre of in-house facilitators able to ensure collaborative decision making and after action reviews to contribute to organisational learning.

Service:

We conducted interviews and reviews with staff in 6 regions worldwide as well as with key informants at the headquarters. We developed a proposal for establishing a learning architecture which included kick off workshops, action learning sets, performance management processes to link to existing appraisal systems and to drive personal development through a facilitated self directed learning approach. We then designed specific initiatives in 'SELF directed learning', 'Brain Based Learning Approaches for Trainers' and 'Facilitating Group Decision Making'

Result:

The first workshops created a real paradigm shift for the participants both for their personal careers and in their professional endeavours. Their experience in brain based approaches led staff to re-evaluate and redesign a wide range of training initiatives throughout the organisation. Once major area of impact was the training related to an ongoing organisation change process and resulting learning connected to new business processes and ERP systems. Trainers reported greater success and buy-in for the change due to their brain friendly design and delivery.